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Lincoln at Cooper Union: The Speech That Made Abraham Lincoln President
Winner of the Lincoln Prize
Lincoln at Cooper Union explores Lincoln's most influential and widely reported pre-presidential address -- an extraordinary appeal by the western politician to the eastern elite that propelled him toward the Republican nomination for president. Delivered in New York in February 1860, the Cooper Union speech dispelled doubts about Lincoln's suitability for the presidency and reassured conservatives of his moderation while reaffirming his opposition to slavery to Republican progressives.
Award-winning Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer places Lincoln and his speech in the context of the times -- an era of racism, politicized journalism, and public oratory as entertainment -- and shows how the candidate framed the speech as an opportunity to continue his famous "debates" with his archrival Democrat Stephen A. Douglas on the question of slavery.
Holzer describes the enormous risk Lincoln took by appearing in New York, where he exposed himself to the country's most critical audience and took on Republican Senator William Henry Seward of New York, the front runner, in his own backyard. Then he recounts a brilliant and innovative public relations campaign, as Lincoln took the speech "on the road" in his successful quest for the presidency.
Lincoln at Cooper Union explores Lincoln's most influential and widely reported pre-presidential address -- an extraordinary appeal by the western politician to the eastern elite that propelled him toward the Republican nomination for president. Delivered in New York in February 1860, the Cooper Union speech dispelled doubts about Lincoln's suitability for the presidency and reassured conservatives of his moderation while reaffirming his opposition to slavery to Republican progressives.
Award-winning Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer places Lincoln and his speech in the context of the times -- an era of racism, politicized journalism, and public oratory as entertainment -- and shows how the candidate framed the speech as an opportunity to continue his famous "debates" with his archrival Democrat Stephen A. Douglas on the question of slavery.
Holzer describes the enormous risk Lincoln took by appearing in New York, where he exposed himself to the country's most critical audience and took on Republican Senator William Henry Seward of New York, the front runner, in his own backyard. Then he recounts a brilliant and innovative public relations campaign, as Lincoln took the speech "on the road" in his successful quest for the presidency.
384 pages, Paperback
First published April 27, 2004
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 84 reviews
May 1, 2022
This succinct book was a surprisingly enjoyable five-star read for me, not necessarily because it rocked my world or was the greatest thing about Abraham Lincoln ever written, but because it accomplishes so well what it sets out to do, and exceeds expectations in the process. In telling the story of just one speech, the book never feels padded with extraneous material, and turns out to provide just the right combination of facts, astute analysis and engaging storytelling.
From the start, Holzer gets right into the story without getting bogged down in recounting Lincoln’s life story or providing chapters of context in an ostensible effort to get the reader up to speed. He offers only as much background as is necessary before beginning with Lincoln’s invitation to speak, ahead of what ultimately led up to his landmark Cooper Union speech in 1860.
While most accounts zip through Lincoln’s preparations for the address and then get right to the speech itself, Holzer provides some important context, interesting details and colorful anecdotes long before Lincoln gets to New York. He describes the invitation to speak not only from Lincoln’s point of view but from that of the organizers, examining their efforts to stage, promote and profit from the event, and the motives behind their invitation, which they sent "with the specific purpose of placing alternative Republicans on display in New York City" to those unimpressed by home-state presidential hopeful William Seward. Holzer even describes how Lincoln’s law partner William Herndon was kind of irked that Lincoln was spending so much time researching and writing his speech, and that he wasn’t asked to help.
Lincoln arrives in New York in chapter 3 but doesn’t start his speech until chapter 6, yet Holzer never leaves us impatient to just get on with it already and get to the main event. He provides an excellent description of the sights and sounds of a 19th-century New York that Lincoln experienced, and a detailed account of Lincoln’s visit to Mathew Brady’s photography studio, which proves to be important to the story later on, as Brady’s photo becomes as important in establishing Lincoln’s national prominence as the speech itself. There’s even an entire chapter that does nothing but describe Lincoln walking onto the auditorium platform and then rising to speak. That's it! With his very thorough descriptions and engaging writing, Holzer is able to make this readable and compelling without seeming like he’s needlessly stretching out his story.
By the time we get to the speech itself, Holzer dissects and analyzes it in just enough detail to be insightful without being didactic. He doesn't quite get into Ronald White-level parsing of individual words, but neither does he do as Lewis Lehrman did in Lincoln at Peoria: The Turning Point and provide so much context and background that the speech itself at the center of the story gets lost in the telling.
As Lincoln made the case that the Framers of the Constitution were overwhelmingly against slavery and that the Constitution did not forbid Congress from legislating on slavery’s expansion, Holzer argues that it was not a “conservative” speech per se, but that Lincoln framed it that way in order to appeal to conservatives and soften the radical image he was branded with after his House Divided speech two years earlier.
Lincoln lore is correct that many newspaper reports about the speech really were glowing and promoted him as a possible president. But Holzer describes how the perceived frontrunner Seward made his own, similar speech two days later and bumped Lincoln from the headlines, showing that he needed to keep making news in order to stay relevant. "The long-held, long-cherished myth that the speech catapulted Lincoln to the pinnacle of party prominence, muted other presidential contenders, and attracted the press's unwavering praise, washes away in the wake of the evidence,” Holzer writes. “Cooper Union did not mark the end of Lincoln's rise; it represented the beginning."
So after the speech, Holzer follows Lincoln on his subsequent, unplanned speaking tour of New England that built upon the Cooper Union speech in positioning Lincoln as presidential material. And once he became his party’s presidential nominee, the widespread republication of the speech effectively allowed Lincoln to campaign without actually campaigning. In all, as Holzer tells it, the Cooper Union story is not just about a single speech, but a three-week-long “career-altering trip.”
Finally, there was one intriguing story that Holzer alluded to but didn’t describe in detail, and I only learned the details after looking them up. One of the images in the book shows what Holzer described (in 2004) as a "recently discovered" ticket to the Cooper Union speech, the only one known to exist, which sounded both intriguing and surprising. Turns out the ticket was apparently discovered in a Louisville, Kentucky antique shop and sold at auction a few years ago for $15,000.
So let that be a lesson to keep your eyes peeled for unexpected historical discoveries! And if you can’t own a piece of that history - Holzer’s telling of it is the next best thing.
From the start, Holzer gets right into the story without getting bogged down in recounting Lincoln’s life story or providing chapters of context in an ostensible effort to get the reader up to speed. He offers only as much background as is necessary before beginning with Lincoln’s invitation to speak, ahead of what ultimately led up to his landmark Cooper Union speech in 1860.
While most accounts zip through Lincoln’s preparations for the address and then get right to the speech itself, Holzer provides some important context, interesting details and colorful anecdotes long before Lincoln gets to New York. He describes the invitation to speak not only from Lincoln’s point of view but from that of the organizers, examining their efforts to stage, promote and profit from the event, and the motives behind their invitation, which they sent "with the specific purpose of placing alternative Republicans on display in New York City" to those unimpressed by home-state presidential hopeful William Seward. Holzer even describes how Lincoln’s law partner William Herndon was kind of irked that Lincoln was spending so much time researching and writing his speech, and that he wasn’t asked to help.
Lincoln arrives in New York in chapter 3 but doesn’t start his speech until chapter 6, yet Holzer never leaves us impatient to just get on with it already and get to the main event. He provides an excellent description of the sights and sounds of a 19th-century New York that Lincoln experienced, and a detailed account of Lincoln’s visit to Mathew Brady’s photography studio, which proves to be important to the story later on, as Brady’s photo becomes as important in establishing Lincoln’s national prominence as the speech itself. There’s even an entire chapter that does nothing but describe Lincoln walking onto the auditorium platform and then rising to speak. That's it! With his very thorough descriptions and engaging writing, Holzer is able to make this readable and compelling without seeming like he’s needlessly stretching out his story.
By the time we get to the speech itself, Holzer dissects and analyzes it in just enough detail to be insightful without being didactic. He doesn't quite get into Ronald White-level parsing of individual words, but neither does he do as Lewis Lehrman did in Lincoln at Peoria: The Turning Point and provide so much context and background that the speech itself at the center of the story gets lost in the telling.
As Lincoln made the case that the Framers of the Constitution were overwhelmingly against slavery and that the Constitution did not forbid Congress from legislating on slavery’s expansion, Holzer argues that it was not a “conservative” speech per se, but that Lincoln framed it that way in order to appeal to conservatives and soften the radical image he was branded with after his House Divided speech two years earlier.
Lincoln lore is correct that many newspaper reports about the speech really were glowing and promoted him as a possible president. But Holzer describes how the perceived frontrunner Seward made his own, similar speech two days later and bumped Lincoln from the headlines, showing that he needed to keep making news in order to stay relevant. "The long-held, long-cherished myth that the speech catapulted Lincoln to the pinnacle of party prominence, muted other presidential contenders, and attracted the press's unwavering praise, washes away in the wake of the evidence,” Holzer writes. “Cooper Union did not mark the end of Lincoln's rise; it represented the beginning."
So after the speech, Holzer follows Lincoln on his subsequent, unplanned speaking tour of New England that built upon the Cooper Union speech in positioning Lincoln as presidential material. And once he became his party’s presidential nominee, the widespread republication of the speech effectively allowed Lincoln to campaign without actually campaigning. In all, as Holzer tells it, the Cooper Union story is not just about a single speech, but a three-week-long “career-altering trip.”
Finally, there was one intriguing story that Holzer alluded to but didn’t describe in detail, and I only learned the details after looking them up. One of the images in the book shows what Holzer described (in 2004) as a "recently discovered" ticket to the Cooper Union speech, the only one known to exist, which sounded both intriguing and surprising. Turns out the ticket was apparently discovered in a Louisville, Kentucky antique shop and sold at auction a few years ago for $15,000.
So let that be a lesson to keep your eyes peeled for unexpected historical discoveries! And if you can’t own a piece of that history - Holzer’s telling of it is the next best thing.
June 23, 2024
The Cooper Union Address
In October, 1859, a small group of young Republican leaders in New York City invited Abraham Lincoln to give an address at Henry Beecher's church in Brooklyn on a subject of Lincoln's choosing. At the time, Lincoln was heavily involved in helping Republican Congressional candidates, was still smarting from his 1858 defeat for the Senate by Stephen Douglas, and was a dark-horse, favorite son for the Republican presidential nomination. Lincoln accepted the invitation, worked painstakingly on the speech, and travelled to New York City to deliver what became the Cooper Union Address on February 27, 1860. (Lincoln was unaware that the venue for the speech had been changed until he arrived in New York.) The speech and its aftermath brought Lincoln national attention. It played a major role in allowing Lincoln to overtake the Republican front-runner, Senator William Seward of New York, and secure the nomination and the presidency.
Harold Holzer is an independent scholar who, in the midst of a busy career at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, has written or edited over twenty books about Lincoln. His most recent book: "Lincoln at Cooper Union: The Speech that made Abraham Lincoln President" (2004) is a comprehensive account of the "momentous" Cooper Union Address, including (p. 1) "its impetus, preparation, delivery, reception, publication, calculated reiteration, and its enormous, perhaps decisive impact on that year's presidential campaign." It is one of a number or recent books that examine in detail a specific Lincoln speech or proclamation, (such at the Gettysburg Address, Second Inaugural Address, Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln-Douglas debates.) But the book does more. It helps the reader understand Lincoln and the issues that lead to the Civil War.
The Cooper Union speech was lengthy, scholarly, and factual and endeavored to show that a majority of the founders -- those that signed the Constitution -- believed that Congress had the right to regulate and prevent the spread of slavery into the territories. This issue was central to the dispute between North and South and to Lincoln's debates with his great opponent, Senator Douglas. Holzer's book begins with a discussion of how Lincoln, the self-educated backwoods lawyer and stump speaker carefully researched this issue in an attempt to present a dispassionate yet morally committed approach to the issue of slavery.
The book includes excellent accounts of the difficult and tiring nature of train travel during Lincoln's time, especially for an aspiring presidential candidate travelling to make a major address. It includes fascinating discussions of the New York City of 1860 --Walt Whitman's New York -- and its docks, piers, hotels, and Broadway. There is a wonderful account of Lincoln's visit while in the City to Five Points -- a notorious slum -- and a letter he subsequently received in the presidency from young men in a charitable school that he visited at the time.
While in New York, Lincoln had a famous photograph taken by Matthew Brady. Brady's artistry made Lincoln look distinguished and presidential rather than like a tall, gangling shabbily dressed backwoodsman. The Brady photo together with the speech helped bring Lincoln to public attention.
In the heart of the book, Holzer offers a detailed analysis of the Cooper Union speech (the text is given in an appendix) and of Lincoln's delivery that fateful evening. Although his audience was initially taken aback by the rough-hewn Lincoln, the substance of the speech and Lincoln's style of his delivery captivated the audience and made an astonishing impression. Lincoln helped shepherd his text into print, and made a hectic speaking tour of New England while visiting his son Robert at Exeter, thus furthering his position as a statesman of vision, integrity, and prudence.
An interesting feature of the book is how Holzer reminds the reader of the fragile nature of historical accounts, including alleged eye-witness accounts. Many times, Holzer points out a received account of the Cooper Union speech and shows in detail how the account is questionably supported or is inconsistent with other sources. (For example, there is a story that Erastus Corning, Director of the New York Central Railroad offered Lincoln the position as corporate counsel following the speech for the large salary of $10,000. Holzer shows that this account lacks foundation.) The book shows how historical sources need to be approached, used, and interpreted with caution.
This book is an outstanding account of Lincoln in his complexity as a pragmatic, opportunistic and yet highly principled leader. It gives a vivid picture of our country and its political life in 1860. It considers issues about the nature of the Union and of human freedom that Lincoln addressed eloquently. These issues remain with us today.
Robin Friedman
In October, 1859, a small group of young Republican leaders in New York City invited Abraham Lincoln to give an address at Henry Beecher's church in Brooklyn on a subject of Lincoln's choosing. At the time, Lincoln was heavily involved in helping Republican Congressional candidates, was still smarting from his 1858 defeat for the Senate by Stephen Douglas, and was a dark-horse, favorite son for the Republican presidential nomination. Lincoln accepted the invitation, worked painstakingly on the speech, and travelled to New York City to deliver what became the Cooper Union Address on February 27, 1860. (Lincoln was unaware that the venue for the speech had been changed until he arrived in New York.) The speech and its aftermath brought Lincoln national attention. It played a major role in allowing Lincoln to overtake the Republican front-runner, Senator William Seward of New York, and secure the nomination and the presidency.
Harold Holzer is an independent scholar who, in the midst of a busy career at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, has written or edited over twenty books about Lincoln. His most recent book: "Lincoln at Cooper Union: The Speech that made Abraham Lincoln President" (2004) is a comprehensive account of the "momentous" Cooper Union Address, including (p. 1) "its impetus, preparation, delivery, reception, publication, calculated reiteration, and its enormous, perhaps decisive impact on that year's presidential campaign." It is one of a number or recent books that examine in detail a specific Lincoln speech or proclamation, (such at the Gettysburg Address, Second Inaugural Address, Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln-Douglas debates.) But the book does more. It helps the reader understand Lincoln and the issues that lead to the Civil War.
The Cooper Union speech was lengthy, scholarly, and factual and endeavored to show that a majority of the founders -- those that signed the Constitution -- believed that Congress had the right to regulate and prevent the spread of slavery into the territories. This issue was central to the dispute between North and South and to Lincoln's debates with his great opponent, Senator Douglas. Holzer's book begins with a discussion of how Lincoln, the self-educated backwoods lawyer and stump speaker carefully researched this issue in an attempt to present a dispassionate yet morally committed approach to the issue of slavery.
The book includes excellent accounts of the difficult and tiring nature of train travel during Lincoln's time, especially for an aspiring presidential candidate travelling to make a major address. It includes fascinating discussions of the New York City of 1860 --Walt Whitman's New York -- and its docks, piers, hotels, and Broadway. There is a wonderful account of Lincoln's visit while in the City to Five Points -- a notorious slum -- and a letter he subsequently received in the presidency from young men in a charitable school that he visited at the time.
While in New York, Lincoln had a famous photograph taken by Matthew Brady. Brady's artistry made Lincoln look distinguished and presidential rather than like a tall, gangling shabbily dressed backwoodsman. The Brady photo together with the speech helped bring Lincoln to public attention.
In the heart of the book, Holzer offers a detailed analysis of the Cooper Union speech (the text is given in an appendix) and of Lincoln's delivery that fateful evening. Although his audience was initially taken aback by the rough-hewn Lincoln, the substance of the speech and Lincoln's style of his delivery captivated the audience and made an astonishing impression. Lincoln helped shepherd his text into print, and made a hectic speaking tour of New England while visiting his son Robert at Exeter, thus furthering his position as a statesman of vision, integrity, and prudence.
An interesting feature of the book is how Holzer reminds the reader of the fragile nature of historical accounts, including alleged eye-witness accounts. Many times, Holzer points out a received account of the Cooper Union speech and shows in detail how the account is questionably supported or is inconsistent with other sources. (For example, there is a story that Erastus Corning, Director of the New York Central Railroad offered Lincoln the position as corporate counsel following the speech for the large salary of $10,000. Holzer shows that this account lacks foundation.) The book shows how historical sources need to be approached, used, and interpreted with caution.
This book is an outstanding account of Lincoln in his complexity as a pragmatic, opportunistic and yet highly principled leader. It gives a vivid picture of our country and its political life in 1860. It considers issues about the nature of the Union and of human freedom that Lincoln addressed eloquently. These issues remain with us today.
Robin Friedman
January 8, 2024
If the Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1858 did not make Abraham Lincoln nationally famous, his speech at New York’s Cooper Union in February of 1860 surely did. Harold Holzer, a noted Lincoln scholar, focuses his attention on the speech, including the events leading up and following it. Therefore a narrow time period is covered, from late 1859 to the election of 1860. Holzer’s focus results in an excellent treatment of what essentially was Lincoln’s biggest campaign speech that also served as his national coming-out party to the influential Eastern Republican establishment.
Following his defeat to Stephen Douglas for the Illinois Senate in 1858, Lincoln returned to focusing part-time on his successful Springfield law practice while also becoming more deeply entrenched in Republican politics. He campaigned for Republicans in the off-year elections in 1859, following Douglas around Ohio. Lincoln’s stock was fairly high in the West (today’s Midwest) but spotty at best out East. This was back when travel was still cumbersome and difficult despite the growing proliferation of railroads. In fact, Holzer touches on the difficulties that Lincoln faced in his travels from Illinois to New York City, and beyond into New England after the speech. While at this point he was able to connect between many different lines, thus avoiding segments on stagecoaches, most of the railroad lines operated independently from each other, and each state used different track gauges. Plus this was before the establishment of time zones like we know today, so a traveler could easily miss a connecting train somewhere along their route. Lincoln had to transfer trains seemingly all the time as he moved out of Illinois, across Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. This occurred again when he went further east through Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and New Hampshire. So Lincoln was travel-weary and exhausted just from the travel, let alone all of the speeches that he had to give and the growing amount of people who wanted to meet with him.
Even the circumstances of Lincoln’s being invited to give the speech, and the negotiations surrounding the date, were not simple. Lincoln was paid $200 for the speech, which his opponents later used against him to characterize him as greedy. Why was he invited? The Young Men’s Central Republican Union was attempting to get multiple speakers to visit New York and speak against slavery. Lincoln negotiated the time to be late February, partially due to his law practice, but also he wanted his speech to occur closer to the Republican nominating convention later in 1860. He also knew that New York Senator William Seward was the odds-on favorite to get the nomination, and that Lincoln had little chance of wresting it away from him without gaining more exposure. A well-advertised speech in New York would do the trick (although Lincoln thought he would be going to Brooklyn to speak at Henry Ward Beecher’s Plymouth Church – this was changed late in the game, with Lincoln finding out only once he got out to New York).
Holzer does dissect the speech, and it is printed in full in the Appendix. This was interesting, as it was a long speech, and much more polished and professional than ones that Lincoln heretofore had given. Holzer goes through Lincoln’s arguments and framing, and his brilliant use of words to both make the historical case against the expansion of slavery and to knock the South for it’s intransigence in accepting nothing short of slavery being expanded without limitation to new territories.
Much time is devoted to myths surrounding both the speech and Lincoln. Holzer carefully goes through many of these, examining the potential for truthfulness and exaggeration in each one. Most of these he made solid cases for. However, one that I am not so sure on surrounds Lincoln’s son Robert. At this time, Robert was a student at Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, which was a preparatory school for getting into – in Robert’s case – Harvard. I do agree with Holzer that Lincoln stating that his primary purpose for embarking on this trip was to see Robert was most likely disingenuous. Lincoln was a shrewd politician, he wanted the Presidential nomination of the Republican Party and knew that most likely if he just stayed out West, it would likely go to Seward. Or if not Seward, someone else such as Salmon Chase of Ohio. However, Holzer downplays the Robert angle so much, insisting that he was more of an excuse for Lincoln to travel into New Hampshire so that he could make speeches there. I am not so sure about this. It seems to me that is speculation on his part. How do we really know what Lincoln’s main motive was in going out there? Could it not have been both? I suspect that it was.
Holzer does a good job of thoroughly documenting Lincoln’s travels both before and after the speech. Lincoln ended up giving a total of eleven speeches while out East, none as big as the one at Cooper Union. However, his appearances there came in handy a few months later when he managed to lock up most of the delegates from CR, RI and NH. Curiously, Holzer does not mention why Lincoln made no speeches in Massachusetts, despite traveling through the state a few times. Was this because MA was considered safe Republican territory already? Did he not receive any invitation to speak in Boston or other towns there? Also, Lincoln at one point was very near the New Hampshire state line with Maine, but did not speak in that state either.
While in New York, the famed photographer Matthew Brady had Lincoln pose for a portrait. Holzer goes into detail about Lincoln’s appearance (it was not pretty) and how Brady tried to take advantage of Lincoln’s great height by having him stand instead of sit, and open his coat to show his vest underneath. One other item that I found interesting is that, in the 1860 election, New Yorkers overwhelmingly rejected a proposed state constitutional amendment that would have allowed free blacks to vote. Manhattan alone voted almost 90% against the proposal. New York was, as Holzer pointed out, a Northern city with some definite Southern sympathies due to its commercial ties with the South and a Mayor (Fernando Wood) who was definitely not for Lincoln or his cause.
This was an excellent look into a narrow but crucial slice of Lincoln’s life. The speech helped propel Lincoln onward and upward. Holzer’s writing is engaging, and he is clearly comfortable and knowledgeable about Lincoln and his times.
Grade: A-
Following his defeat to Stephen Douglas for the Illinois Senate in 1858, Lincoln returned to focusing part-time on his successful Springfield law practice while also becoming more deeply entrenched in Republican politics. He campaigned for Republicans in the off-year elections in 1859, following Douglas around Ohio. Lincoln’s stock was fairly high in the West (today’s Midwest) but spotty at best out East. This was back when travel was still cumbersome and difficult despite the growing proliferation of railroads. In fact, Holzer touches on the difficulties that Lincoln faced in his travels from Illinois to New York City, and beyond into New England after the speech. While at this point he was able to connect between many different lines, thus avoiding segments on stagecoaches, most of the railroad lines operated independently from each other, and each state used different track gauges. Plus this was before the establishment of time zones like we know today, so a traveler could easily miss a connecting train somewhere along their route. Lincoln had to transfer trains seemingly all the time as he moved out of Illinois, across Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. This occurred again when he went further east through Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and New Hampshire. So Lincoln was travel-weary and exhausted just from the travel, let alone all of the speeches that he had to give and the growing amount of people who wanted to meet with him.
Even the circumstances of Lincoln’s being invited to give the speech, and the negotiations surrounding the date, were not simple. Lincoln was paid $200 for the speech, which his opponents later used against him to characterize him as greedy. Why was he invited? The Young Men’s Central Republican Union was attempting to get multiple speakers to visit New York and speak against slavery. Lincoln negotiated the time to be late February, partially due to his law practice, but also he wanted his speech to occur closer to the Republican nominating convention later in 1860. He also knew that New York Senator William Seward was the odds-on favorite to get the nomination, and that Lincoln had little chance of wresting it away from him without gaining more exposure. A well-advertised speech in New York would do the trick (although Lincoln thought he would be going to Brooklyn to speak at Henry Ward Beecher’s Plymouth Church – this was changed late in the game, with Lincoln finding out only once he got out to New York).
Holzer does dissect the speech, and it is printed in full in the Appendix. This was interesting, as it was a long speech, and much more polished and professional than ones that Lincoln heretofore had given. Holzer goes through Lincoln’s arguments and framing, and his brilliant use of words to both make the historical case against the expansion of slavery and to knock the South for it’s intransigence in accepting nothing short of slavery being expanded without limitation to new territories.
Much time is devoted to myths surrounding both the speech and Lincoln. Holzer carefully goes through many of these, examining the potential for truthfulness and exaggeration in each one. Most of these he made solid cases for. However, one that I am not so sure on surrounds Lincoln’s son Robert. At this time, Robert was a student at Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, which was a preparatory school for getting into – in Robert’s case – Harvard. I do agree with Holzer that Lincoln stating that his primary purpose for embarking on this trip was to see Robert was most likely disingenuous. Lincoln was a shrewd politician, he wanted the Presidential nomination of the Republican Party and knew that most likely if he just stayed out West, it would likely go to Seward. Or if not Seward, someone else such as Salmon Chase of Ohio. However, Holzer downplays the Robert angle so much, insisting that he was more of an excuse for Lincoln to travel into New Hampshire so that he could make speeches there. I am not so sure about this. It seems to me that is speculation on his part. How do we really know what Lincoln’s main motive was in going out there? Could it not have been both? I suspect that it was.
Holzer does a good job of thoroughly documenting Lincoln’s travels both before and after the speech. Lincoln ended up giving a total of eleven speeches while out East, none as big as the one at Cooper Union. However, his appearances there came in handy a few months later when he managed to lock up most of the delegates from CR, RI and NH. Curiously, Holzer does not mention why Lincoln made no speeches in Massachusetts, despite traveling through the state a few times. Was this because MA was considered safe Republican territory already? Did he not receive any invitation to speak in Boston or other towns there? Also, Lincoln at one point was very near the New Hampshire state line with Maine, but did not speak in that state either.
While in New York, the famed photographer Matthew Brady had Lincoln pose for a portrait. Holzer goes into detail about Lincoln’s appearance (it was not pretty) and how Brady tried to take advantage of Lincoln’s great height by having him stand instead of sit, and open his coat to show his vest underneath. One other item that I found interesting is that, in the 1860 election, New Yorkers overwhelmingly rejected a proposed state constitutional amendment that would have allowed free blacks to vote. Manhattan alone voted almost 90% against the proposal. New York was, as Holzer pointed out, a Northern city with some definite Southern sympathies due to its commercial ties with the South and a Mayor (Fernando Wood) who was definitely not for Lincoln or his cause.
This was an excellent look into a narrow but crucial slice of Lincoln’s life. The speech helped propel Lincoln onward and upward. Holzer’s writing is engaging, and he is clearly comfortable and knowledgeable about Lincoln and his times.
Grade: A-
December 15, 2022
I've put off reading this book for a while. I know a lot about Lincoln, the Civil War is one of *MY* niches.
If you study the Civil War or Lincoln, then you know that Cooper Union was a pivotal point in his career. Any biogphay on his life or coverage of the period mentions Cooper Union. Other books might talk about how the speech transformed him from a bumbling uneducated cooth from the frontier into a sophisticated scholar, but rarely do they go into much detail. At best you might get 2-3 paragraphs on the subject.
Holzer's work took the premise which I knew and understood and developed it into a masterpiece.
The first third of the book discusses the period between the Douglas debates and his appearance at Cooper Union. This section deals with how he arrived in New York expecting to speak before one group of people only to discover that he was going to have an entirely different audience. How he was ill prepared for the big city---and yet ended up in one of the most prestigious photo galleries in the US.
Matthew Brady was THE photographer of the mid 1800s. Everyone who is anyone wants to get their picture taken there, but Brady was not satisfied with taking a normal picture of Lincoln (he physically didn't fit) so he worked with what he had to create one of the most iconic images of the era. An image that would become one of the first photos ever mass produced.
Lincoln then had to rewrite his speech because the location of the speech was changed and the audience was not what he originally planned..
He needed to emphasize who he wanted the social elite of New York wanted to see. Somebody who was sophisticated, educated, and learned. Lincoln could not show up spouting the homespun frontiersman jargon he had become known for, he had to convince the learned elite in NY that he was worthy of their vote.
Today we get bored if a speech exceeds the 10-15 minutes, in the mid 1800s they last an hour to two or even three hour monologues. They required that speaker to capture the audience similar to the way of a modern Hollywood block busters. The speeches would be reviewed and reported. People would spend hours on horse or wagon to go to a good speech.
Lincoln delivered.
The second third of the book disects Lincoln's speech. It goes through the various linguistic and legal tricks that Lincoln employed during his speech. If you want to learn how to write a speech, this is a good primer. How did Lincoln introduce the subject, "This is what my opponent says and he is absolutely correct! I'm not going to waste our time debating his premise because it is beyond reproach." What I am going to do is tell you how and why his application of the premise is wrong. On the one hand you have those who don't understand, on the otherhand you have those (like us in this room) who can see beyond that, people (like us) who do understand.
There were other techniques Lincoln used, but by the end of the speach, he had crafted a speach that extolled virtue, internal consistency, an understanding of American history, and a call for unity---while portraying those who didn't agree with it as doing so willfully ignorant.
The last third of the book talks about how this speach propelled Lincoln from the person who debated Douglas into the most sought after public speaker in northern America. Who wanted him to speak? Why? How did he adapt based upon the audience?
I often read books that offer grandoise conclusions about the importance of a specific aspect, rarely do I finish the book thinking that the author delivered.
Holzer delivered.
If you study the Civil War or Lincoln, then you know that Cooper Union was a pivotal point in his career. Any biogphay on his life or coverage of the period mentions Cooper Union. Other books might talk about how the speech transformed him from a bumbling uneducated cooth from the frontier into a sophisticated scholar, but rarely do they go into much detail. At best you might get 2-3 paragraphs on the subject.
Holzer's work took the premise which I knew and understood and developed it into a masterpiece.
The first third of the book discusses the period between the Douglas debates and his appearance at Cooper Union. This section deals with how he arrived in New York expecting to speak before one group of people only to discover that he was going to have an entirely different audience. How he was ill prepared for the big city---and yet ended up in one of the most prestigious photo galleries in the US.
Matthew Brady was THE photographer of the mid 1800s. Everyone who is anyone wants to get their picture taken there, but Brady was not satisfied with taking a normal picture of Lincoln (he physically didn't fit) so he worked with what he had to create one of the most iconic images of the era. An image that would become one of the first photos ever mass produced.
Lincoln then had to rewrite his speech because the location of the speech was changed and the audience was not what he originally planned..
He needed to emphasize who he wanted the social elite of New York wanted to see. Somebody who was sophisticated, educated, and learned. Lincoln could not show up spouting the homespun frontiersman jargon he had become known for, he had to convince the learned elite in NY that he was worthy of their vote.
Today we get bored if a speech exceeds the 10-15 minutes, in the mid 1800s they last an hour to two or even three hour monologues. They required that speaker to capture the audience similar to the way of a modern Hollywood block busters. The speeches would be reviewed and reported. People would spend hours on horse or wagon to go to a good speech.
Lincoln delivered.
The second third of the book disects Lincoln's speech. It goes through the various linguistic and legal tricks that Lincoln employed during his speech. If you want to learn how to write a speech, this is a good primer. How did Lincoln introduce the subject, "This is what my opponent says and he is absolutely correct! I'm not going to waste our time debating his premise because it is beyond reproach." What I am going to do is tell you how and why his application of the premise is wrong. On the one hand you have those who don't understand, on the otherhand you have those (like us in this room) who can see beyond that, people (like us) who do understand.
There were other techniques Lincoln used, but by the end of the speach, he had crafted a speach that extolled virtue, internal consistency, an understanding of American history, and a call for unity---while portraying those who didn't agree with it as doing so willfully ignorant.
The last third of the book talks about how this speach propelled Lincoln from the person who debated Douglas into the most sought after public speaker in northern America. Who wanted him to speak? Why? How did he adapt based upon the audience?
I often read books that offer grandoise conclusions about the importance of a specific aspect, rarely do I finish the book thinking that the author delivered.
Holzer delivered.
December 15, 2023
I think that I have read more books about Lincoln and the Civil War period than just about any other topic and that is since I was a kid reading the Chicago Tribune with its daily article about what had happened 100 years before...this was during the Civil War Centennial of 1961-65! So this is yet another Lincoln book. But it was interesting to me as it focused on one crucial event in Lincoln's life. That is the speech Lincoln delivered at the Great Hall of Cooper Union in New York City in February, 1860. This speech was in effect a continuation of the Lincoln-Douglas debates which had been held in Illinois in 1858. By making an important speech (which was so well-received), Lincoln showed that he needed to be taken seriously as a candidate for the presidency in that election year of 1860. He certainly showed the Easterners that he was more than just a backwoods lawyer from what was considered the "Western" state of Illinois. As Holzer says, no Cooper Union speech, no Gettysburg Address, as Lincoln would not have been nominated by the Republican Party to run for president--if he had not made that speech.
December 4, 2013
A few months back I had finished Harold Holzer's "Lincoln: President-Elect" and therefore anticipated another five stars. I was not disappointed. If I were to read these two books again however, I would read this book first.
Lately, I have been trying to better familiarize myself with some of the most important documents and speeches of our nation's history, and Lincoln's Cooper Union ranks pretty close to the top. Lincoln basically summarizes the north/south conflict with slavery, and presents his viewpoint on how to best deal with it as a moderate Republican abolitionist candidate for President. Because of Lincoln's simple, solid, and convincing logic, it was hugely successful. The text of the speech was therefore reprinted many times in the papers, and later sold quite well in annotated pamphlet form. In short, his speech catapulted him to become one of the leading contenders for the Republican nominee for President in 1860, and later to become our nation's 16th President.
Harold Holzer presents the story of Lincoln's Cooper Union speech very well. He doesn't examine it line-by-line like I expected him to, (probably because this speech is so long) but instead, he dissects the most important aspects of it, and also examines the history of how those ideas evolved. My only criticism is that Holzer could have added another chapter or two in examination of the speech itself, but decided to concentrate more on it's history instead. But all-in-all Holzer does a superb job of presenting Lincoln's Cooper Union, and I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning more about Lincoln's most famous pre-presidential speech.
Lately, I have been trying to better familiarize myself with some of the most important documents and speeches of our nation's history, and Lincoln's Cooper Union ranks pretty close to the top. Lincoln basically summarizes the north/south conflict with slavery, and presents his viewpoint on how to best deal with it as a moderate Republican abolitionist candidate for President. Because of Lincoln's simple, solid, and convincing logic, it was hugely successful. The text of the speech was therefore reprinted many times in the papers, and later sold quite well in annotated pamphlet form. In short, his speech catapulted him to become one of the leading contenders for the Republican nominee for President in 1860, and later to become our nation's 16th President.
Harold Holzer presents the story of Lincoln's Cooper Union speech very well. He doesn't examine it line-by-line like I expected him to, (probably because this speech is so long) but instead, he dissects the most important aspects of it, and also examines the history of how those ideas evolved. My only criticism is that Holzer could have added another chapter or two in examination of the speech itself, but decided to concentrate more on it's history instead. But all-in-all Holzer does a superb job of presenting Lincoln's Cooper Union, and I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning more about Lincoln's most famous pre-presidential speech.
December 16, 2020
I was pleasantly surprised how engaging Harold Holzer’s probing narrative of Abraham Lincoln’s most influential and mobilizing pre-presidential speech was in Lincoln at Cooper Union: The Speech That Made Abraham Lincoln President. This monumental speech would cement Lincoln as a top-tiered Republican candidate for the 1860 presidential nomination. Holzer meticulously follows Lincoln through this defining period of Lincoln’s rise to the Presidency in late 1859 and early 1860. On the heels of his profile-raising Lincoln-Douglas debates and failed Senate run in 1858, Holzer shadows Lincoln through to his nomination as the Republican candidate for President in 1860, climaxing with Lincoln’s most important pre-presidential speech at the Cooper Union.
Coming off of a disappointing 1858 U.S. Senate seat loss to arch-rival Stephen Douglas— in which Republicans in Illinois won the state-wide popular vote yet Democrats won a majority of House seats, thus allowing the state legislature to award the Senate seat to Douglas— Lincoln became a rising star in the burgeoning Republican Party. After defeat, a dejected Lincoln returned to practicing law. Nevertheless, Lincoln continued to make speeches for the Republican anti-slavery platform, including an unofficial extension of the Lincoln-Douglas debates where he trailed Douglas to Ohio, relentlessly needling Douglass’s “popular-sovereignty” principle of slavery expansion.
In October 1859 Lincoln accepted an invitation to lecture at Henry Ward Beecher's church in Brooklyn, New York to deliver a lecture on a political topic of his choosing. Understanding the opportunity for a still relatively unknown western politician to be introduced to vote-rich eastern audiences and media, the politically savvy Lincoln accepted. With the speech to be delivered in February 1860, Lincoln began to painstakingly craft his speech. Upon arriving in New York, Lincoln learned the speech had been moved to Manhattan at the Cooper Institute. The stakes were raised.
Lincoln labored over his speech for weeks, building three distinct arguments. First, digging deep into the founding father’s positions on the constitutionality of regulating slavery in the federal territories, he clearly showed a majority believed they could. By proving such, he reclaimed the “conservative” position from the Democratic argument, by binding his position to the founders. Next, he mocked the Southern Democratic position that the Republicans were merely a “sectional” party stating that it was they who threatened secession unless the constitution was interpreted as they saw fit. Third, in a call to arm to his fellow Republicans, Lincoln stated that if slavery is not wrong, then nothing is right. If Republicans cannot end slavery where it exists, they must fight through their votes to prevent its expansion. In a final call to action, Lincoln famously claimed “Let us have faith that RIGHT MAKES MIGHT, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it!” Using cool logic and statements of fact, the speech electrified the audience and gained Lincoln important political support in political rival William Seward's home territory.
Lincoln at Cooper Union is a masterful account of the speech that ultimately made Lincoln president. Harold Holzer’s work is a must read for any Lincoln buff who wants a clear understanding of this pivotal moment in Lincoln’s rise to the Presidency.
Coming off of a disappointing 1858 U.S. Senate seat loss to arch-rival Stephen Douglas— in which Republicans in Illinois won the state-wide popular vote yet Democrats won a majority of House seats, thus allowing the state legislature to award the Senate seat to Douglas— Lincoln became a rising star in the burgeoning Republican Party. After defeat, a dejected Lincoln returned to practicing law. Nevertheless, Lincoln continued to make speeches for the Republican anti-slavery platform, including an unofficial extension of the Lincoln-Douglas debates where he trailed Douglas to Ohio, relentlessly needling Douglass’s “popular-sovereignty” principle of slavery expansion.
In October 1859 Lincoln accepted an invitation to lecture at Henry Ward Beecher's church in Brooklyn, New York to deliver a lecture on a political topic of his choosing. Understanding the opportunity for a still relatively unknown western politician to be introduced to vote-rich eastern audiences and media, the politically savvy Lincoln accepted. With the speech to be delivered in February 1860, Lincoln began to painstakingly craft his speech. Upon arriving in New York, Lincoln learned the speech had been moved to Manhattan at the Cooper Institute. The stakes were raised.
Lincoln labored over his speech for weeks, building three distinct arguments. First, digging deep into the founding father’s positions on the constitutionality of regulating slavery in the federal territories, he clearly showed a majority believed they could. By proving such, he reclaimed the “conservative” position from the Democratic argument, by binding his position to the founders. Next, he mocked the Southern Democratic position that the Republicans were merely a “sectional” party stating that it was they who threatened secession unless the constitution was interpreted as they saw fit. Third, in a call to arm to his fellow Republicans, Lincoln stated that if slavery is not wrong, then nothing is right. If Republicans cannot end slavery where it exists, they must fight through their votes to prevent its expansion. In a final call to action, Lincoln famously claimed “Let us have faith that RIGHT MAKES MIGHT, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it!” Using cool logic and statements of fact, the speech electrified the audience and gained Lincoln important political support in political rival William Seward's home territory.
Lincoln at Cooper Union is a masterful account of the speech that ultimately made Lincoln president. Harold Holzer’s work is a must read for any Lincoln buff who wants a clear understanding of this pivotal moment in Lincoln’s rise to the Presidency.
February 22, 2021
- "Without Cooper Union, Lincoln might have ended up, at best, as a historical footnote."
- Harold Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union
Lincoln at Cooper Union: The Speech That Made Abraham Lincoln President is an interesting work on a speech delivered by Abraham Lincoln in February 1860 at the Cooper Institute in New York City, a speech which author Harold Holzer argues led to Lincoln’s selection as the Republican candidate and therefore President. Holzer is a renowned expert on Abraham Lincoln and the political culture of the Civil War era, but he is not a professional historian. He has worked in public relations and was a speech-writer for Mario Cuomo.
While historians have long agreed that Lincoln’s Cooper Union speech played a critical role in Lincoln's rise from obscurity outside his home state of Illinois to the presidency of the United States, the reasons for this rise have not been well explained. Holzer cogently argues that the Cooper Union address, and related events, was the critical incident in Lincoln's road to the White House.
In 1860, the Republican Party was only six years old, formed around the conviction that slavery should not be allowed to spread to the new states coming into the union. Despite the party’s recent formation, it had become clear that 1860 would provide a significant opportunity to capture the White House. However, the acknowledged Republican front-runner, New York senator William H. Seward, was not the man many New York Republicans wanted to nominate. Moderate Northern voters did not care for Seward’s inflammatory declarations against slavery, nor did they care for Seward’s powerful promoter, Thurlow Weed. Lincoln, who had gained national notice in his campaign debates with Stephen Douglas, was invited to give a lecture in New York City on February 27, 1860, just a few months before the national convention, as part of a series organized by the Young Men's Republican Union. The series was designed to give western Republicans a platform before the eastern Republican establishment on critical issues before the national elections. This was also an opportunity for Lincoln to speak before powerful men like Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune and William Cullen Bryant of the Evening Post. Holzer maintains Lincoln was fully aware that he was being given a golden opportunity for a shot at the presidency. Lincoln intended the speech to be a scholarly, legally powerful rebuttal to Democrat Stephen Douglas's doctrine of "popular sovereignty" in the western territories, which claimed that the country's founders had forbidden Congress to meddle in territorial slavery. Lincoln would argue that Congress had the authority to restrict the spread of slavery into the western territories. As Holzer explains, this was to "prove historically what he had long argued politically: that the extension of slavery was wrong" and that it contradicted the intentions of the founding fathers.
After the invitation arrived in October 1859, Lincoln spent several months in exhaustive preparation, precisely because he knew this was to be the most important speech of his life. Lincoln thoroughly researched his topic, which was to be the right of the federal government to prohibit slavery. Holzer builds tension and anticipation in the chapters leading up to the actual speech, giving the reader a taste of politics in the days when the public was drawn to hear great speakers, especially politicians. As the day for his speech approaches, Holzer shows a remarkable ability to build tension and anticipation leading to the actual speech. Readers follow the future president on his exhausting train trip, as Lincoln sits for four days in train cars to get from Illinois to New York City. We hear of the people he meets on the journey, their conversations and their impressions of Lincoln. Readers experience his visit to the photography studio of Mathew Brady, who took one of the most memorable of all Lincoln photographs. We discover that the venue was changed at the last minute from Henry Ward Beecher’s Plymouth Church in Brooklyn to the Cooper Institute in Manhattan.
At Cooper Union, Lincoln was introduced by William Cullen Bryant. Initially, many in the audience were startled at Lincoln’s ungainly, unkempt appearance. The author quotes an eyewitness to Lincoln’s speech:
- “‘When Lincoln rose to speak, I was greatly disappointed. He was tall – oh, how tall and so angular and awkward that I had, for an instant, a feeling of pity for so ungainly a man. His clothes were travel-stained, ill-fitting and badly wrinkled. He began in a low tone of voice – as if he were used to speaking outdoors and was afraid of speaking too loud. He said ‘Mr. Chairman,’ and he employed many other old-fashioned words. I said to myself: ‘Old fellow, you won’t do; it’s all very well for the wild west, but this will never do in New York.’”
- Harold Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union
What followed as a 90-minute master work that combined intellectual power with a fierce determination to clarify his convictions. Digging deep into early American history, Lincoln refuted Douglas' claim that the country's founders had forbidden Congress to meddle in territorial slavery. The speech consisted of three main sections:
1. The first section began with Lincoln’s challenge of an essay published by Douglas in Harper's, in which Douglas claimed the authority of the founders for popular sovereignty. Lincoln examines the views of the 39 signers of the Constitution, and cleverly and convincingly demonstrates from their votes that the fathers overwhelmingly opposed slavery and believed that the federal government had the right to use its powers to restrict the spread of slavery into the new territories.
2. In the second section, Lincoln addresses himself directly to “the Southern people,” insisting that they, by agitating the country over slavery, were responsible for the nation’s growing sectional crisis.
3. The final, and shortest, section turns to application. Lincoln asks his fellow Republicans what their response should be. He asserts that Republicans cannot surrender their principles in order to placate the South. At the end of his speech, he admonishes his fellow Republicans to hold firm with his now famous line: “Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.”
Holzer devotes forty percent of the book to what happened after the speech, emphasizing that "Cooper Union did not mark the end of Lincoln's rise; it represented the beginning." When Lincoln finished, the audience "broke out in wild and prolonged enthusiasm," according to one eyewitness, while another declared that Lincoln was the "greatest man since St. Paul". The Cooper Union speech had demonstrated to a sophisticated Eastern audience that Lincoln was not some ill-educated frontiersman but was a brilliant national politician with matchless oratorical skills. By the next day, 170,000 printed copies of the speech appeared in newspapers and pamphlets. The speech made Lincoln a celebrity and helped the homely, awkward man from Illinois win the Republican presidential nomination.
- "Cooper Union was not just a speech, it was a conquest—a public relations triumph, a political coup d'etat within the Republican party, and an image transfiguration abetted by the press…."
- Harold Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union
- "Cooper Union proved a unique confluence of political culture, rhetorical opportunity, technological innovation, and human genius, and it brought Abraham Lincoln to the center stage of American politics at precisely the right time and place, and with precisely the right message."
- Harold Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union
Harold Holzer has powerfully described the story behind Lincoln's speech against the extension of slavery. His narrative is wonderfully elegant; it’s a delightful book to read.
"Lincoln at Cooper Union is the most interesting and important book on the sixteenth president published in years. Its richly detailed account of Lincoln's visit to New York in 1860 is as absorbing as any novel, and its close analysis of Lincoln's Cooper Union address adds significantly to our understanding of his political philosophy. I recommend it enthusiastically." — David Herbert Donald, author of Lincoln
- Harold Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union
Lincoln at Cooper Union: The Speech That Made Abraham Lincoln President is an interesting work on a speech delivered by Abraham Lincoln in February 1860 at the Cooper Institute in New York City, a speech which author Harold Holzer argues led to Lincoln’s selection as the Republican candidate and therefore President. Holzer is a renowned expert on Abraham Lincoln and the political culture of the Civil War era, but he is not a professional historian. He has worked in public relations and was a speech-writer for Mario Cuomo.
While historians have long agreed that Lincoln’s Cooper Union speech played a critical role in Lincoln's rise from obscurity outside his home state of Illinois to the presidency of the United States, the reasons for this rise have not been well explained. Holzer cogently argues that the Cooper Union address, and related events, was the critical incident in Lincoln's road to the White House.
In 1860, the Republican Party was only six years old, formed around the conviction that slavery should not be allowed to spread to the new states coming into the union. Despite the party’s recent formation, it had become clear that 1860 would provide a significant opportunity to capture the White House. However, the acknowledged Republican front-runner, New York senator William H. Seward, was not the man many New York Republicans wanted to nominate. Moderate Northern voters did not care for Seward’s inflammatory declarations against slavery, nor did they care for Seward’s powerful promoter, Thurlow Weed. Lincoln, who had gained national notice in his campaign debates with Stephen Douglas, was invited to give a lecture in New York City on February 27, 1860, just a few months before the national convention, as part of a series organized by the Young Men's Republican Union. The series was designed to give western Republicans a platform before the eastern Republican establishment on critical issues before the national elections. This was also an opportunity for Lincoln to speak before powerful men like Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune and William Cullen Bryant of the Evening Post. Holzer maintains Lincoln was fully aware that he was being given a golden opportunity for a shot at the presidency. Lincoln intended the speech to be a scholarly, legally powerful rebuttal to Democrat Stephen Douglas's doctrine of "popular sovereignty" in the western territories, which claimed that the country's founders had forbidden Congress to meddle in territorial slavery. Lincoln would argue that Congress had the authority to restrict the spread of slavery into the western territories. As Holzer explains, this was to "prove historically what he had long argued politically: that the extension of slavery was wrong" and that it contradicted the intentions of the founding fathers.
After the invitation arrived in October 1859, Lincoln spent several months in exhaustive preparation, precisely because he knew this was to be the most important speech of his life. Lincoln thoroughly researched his topic, which was to be the right of the federal government to prohibit slavery. Holzer builds tension and anticipation in the chapters leading up to the actual speech, giving the reader a taste of politics in the days when the public was drawn to hear great speakers, especially politicians. As the day for his speech approaches, Holzer shows a remarkable ability to build tension and anticipation leading to the actual speech. Readers follow the future president on his exhausting train trip, as Lincoln sits for four days in train cars to get from Illinois to New York City. We hear of the people he meets on the journey, their conversations and their impressions of Lincoln. Readers experience his visit to the photography studio of Mathew Brady, who took one of the most memorable of all Lincoln photographs. We discover that the venue was changed at the last minute from Henry Ward Beecher’s Plymouth Church in Brooklyn to the Cooper Institute in Manhattan.
At Cooper Union, Lincoln was introduced by William Cullen Bryant. Initially, many in the audience were startled at Lincoln’s ungainly, unkempt appearance. The author quotes an eyewitness to Lincoln’s speech:
- “‘When Lincoln rose to speak, I was greatly disappointed. He was tall – oh, how tall and so angular and awkward that I had, for an instant, a feeling of pity for so ungainly a man. His clothes were travel-stained, ill-fitting and badly wrinkled. He began in a low tone of voice – as if he were used to speaking outdoors and was afraid of speaking too loud. He said ‘Mr. Chairman,’ and he employed many other old-fashioned words. I said to myself: ‘Old fellow, you won’t do; it’s all very well for the wild west, but this will never do in New York.’”
- Harold Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union
What followed as a 90-minute master work that combined intellectual power with a fierce determination to clarify his convictions. Digging deep into early American history, Lincoln refuted Douglas' claim that the country's founders had forbidden Congress to meddle in territorial slavery. The speech consisted of three main sections:
1. The first section began with Lincoln’s challenge of an essay published by Douglas in Harper's, in which Douglas claimed the authority of the founders for popular sovereignty. Lincoln examines the views of the 39 signers of the Constitution, and cleverly and convincingly demonstrates from their votes that the fathers overwhelmingly opposed slavery and believed that the federal government had the right to use its powers to restrict the spread of slavery into the new territories.
2. In the second section, Lincoln addresses himself directly to “the Southern people,” insisting that they, by agitating the country over slavery, were responsible for the nation’s growing sectional crisis.
3. The final, and shortest, section turns to application. Lincoln asks his fellow Republicans what their response should be. He asserts that Republicans cannot surrender their principles in order to placate the South. At the end of his speech, he admonishes his fellow Republicans to hold firm with his now famous line: “Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.”
Holzer devotes forty percent of the book to what happened after the speech, emphasizing that "Cooper Union did not mark the end of Lincoln's rise; it represented the beginning." When Lincoln finished, the audience "broke out in wild and prolonged enthusiasm," according to one eyewitness, while another declared that Lincoln was the "greatest man since St. Paul". The Cooper Union speech had demonstrated to a sophisticated Eastern audience that Lincoln was not some ill-educated frontiersman but was a brilliant national politician with matchless oratorical skills. By the next day, 170,000 printed copies of the speech appeared in newspapers and pamphlets. The speech made Lincoln a celebrity and helped the homely, awkward man from Illinois win the Republican presidential nomination.
- "Cooper Union was not just a speech, it was a conquest—a public relations triumph, a political coup d'etat within the Republican party, and an image transfiguration abetted by the press…."
- Harold Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union
- "Cooper Union proved a unique confluence of political culture, rhetorical opportunity, technological innovation, and human genius, and it brought Abraham Lincoln to the center stage of American politics at precisely the right time and place, and with precisely the right message."
- Harold Holzer, Lincoln at Cooper Union
Harold Holzer has powerfully described the story behind Lincoln's speech against the extension of slavery. His narrative is wonderfully elegant; it’s a delightful book to read.
"Lincoln at Cooper Union is the most interesting and important book on the sixteenth president published in years. Its richly detailed account of Lincoln's visit to New York in 1860 is as absorbing as any novel, and its close analysis of Lincoln's Cooper Union address adds significantly to our understanding of his political philosophy. I recommend it enthusiastically." — David Herbert Donald, author of Lincoln
January 15, 2016
This book corrects what is a curious and unfortunate lacuna in the historical record about Abraham Lincoln’s speeches, and that is the absence of a substantial work on the Cooper Union Address, one of the most famous speeches hardly anyone has ever read. It is curious that given the huge attention the Civil War and Abraham Lincoln commands that this is the first full-length book ever that deals with the first and only major speech given by Abraham Lincoln during the entire 1860 presidential campaign. For that alone this book is essential for anyone who wishes to understand the real Lincoln and his development of a mature fact-based style of speaking that proved him to be a reputable political historian of the highest order.
The book is organized well and persuasively to bring Lincoln’s neglected Cooper Union speech (about which I have written before, in “Let Us Have Faith That Right Makes Might: The Enduring Relevance of Lincoln’s Cooper Union Speech[1]”) to the forefront of attention for students of Lincoln’s oratory. The introduction of the book shows the forgotten nature of Lincoln’s speech and the place this book serves in filling the gap in the historiography of Lincoln’s career. Then Holzer examines the tangled negotiations and political skullduggery that led a group of New York Republicans to invite mostly obscure western Republican stump speakers (including Lincoln) to give a series of political speeches to help draw votes away from Seward and for their favored candidate, Chase. After this Holzer examines the difficult historical labor that Lincoln spent in researching thoroughly the positions of the Founding Fathers (those 39 men who signed the US Constitution) in actual votes to allow or deny federal authority to regulate slavery in the territories, finding that 21 of the founders had explicitly voted in favor of such Congressional limitations either under the Articles of Confederation or Constitution, and that only 2 voted against such restrictions. Additionally, some of the other sixteen who had no official vote on record were known to be among the most noted antislavery men in the United States at the time of the Founding (Alexander Hamilton and Benjamin Franklin, for example).
At this point the book continues its very detailed and fact-based narrative and examines Lincoln’s trip to New York City (a harrowing one full of late-night transfers and dreadful conditions) as well as the ramshackle state of New York’s streets from primary source documentation. The book demonstrates Lincoln’s savvy about dealing with newspaper editors (in order to have his speeches published with the best formatting and to his advantage as a politician) as well as his desire to finally have a good campaign photo, which is provided in this case by the incomparable Matthew Brady. More than 100 pages of the book are complete by the time the book shows an awkward and rough looking Abraham Lincoln standing on the stage at Cooper Union on a chilly February evening beginning his speech and making a bad first impression (but a marvelous following one) on the sophisticated New York audience.
The longest chapter of the book, which is a close analysis of the Cooper Union speech and its fact-based approach, follows. Holzer demonstrates that Lincoln’s rhetoric, while not using triads (by the people, for the people, of the people) as he would so eloquently in later speeches, was itself a sophisticated example of parallelism that showed considerable elegance. Likewise, the Cooper Union was three speeches in one: the first, and longest, a masterpiece of political history, examining in detail the positions of the Founding Fathers on the issue of Congressional authority to regulate slavery in the territories in refutation of Stephen Douglas’ spurious Popular Sovereignty doctrine [2], the second a subtle attack on the South, and the third a stirring call to action for Republicans to remain true to their principles in the face of the pressure to compromise for the sake of a hollow peace.
After this most excellent summary of the speech itself (the entire speech is, including historical footnotes from a pamphlet whose publication was supervised by Lincoln, included in an Appendix which demonstrates Lincoln’s historical brilliance in vivid detail), Holzer focuses on the immensely positive impression Lincoln made on his audience. Additionally, Holzer examines in detail the often neglected follow-up speeches made in the Northeast (including one in Exeter, New Hampshire, where his eldest son Robert was attending a prep school to prepare for Harvard) that showed Lincoln’s rising position as a hopeful for the presidency as a direct result of the Cooper Union speech. The book closes with an examination of Lincoln’s subdued behavior through the rest of the 1860 campaign, which was according to the Victorian customs of reserve and silence, and an Epilogue which shows some of the later fate of the principals of the speech (showing that Lincoln rewarded most of the men who invited him to speak in New York, and demonstrating his recognition of the importance of the speech in winning him the Republican nomination).
The book as a whole is a gripping historical narrative, full of intriguing footnotes and showing the care and diligent historical research of a master historian. Anyone who wishes to see Lincoln’s savvy dealings with the press and his own careful attention to historical work and speech preparation ought to read this rewarding book. The fact that the book includes a great many quotations from Lincoln’s letters and those other letters and statements about him from his contemporaries makes the book a treasure trove of useful quotations and useful sources for the Lincoln scholar. I highly recommend this book, which is a definitive work on the importance and rhetorical excellence of Abraham Lincoln’s Cooper Union Address, fully meeting the ambitious goals set out by its able author to provide new and useful research about Abraham Lincoln and the pivotal importance of his most significant pre-presidential speech.
[1] https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress...
[2] https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress...
The book is organized well and persuasively to bring Lincoln’s neglected Cooper Union speech (about which I have written before, in “Let Us Have Faith That Right Makes Might: The Enduring Relevance of Lincoln’s Cooper Union Speech[1]”) to the forefront of attention for students of Lincoln’s oratory. The introduction of the book shows the forgotten nature of Lincoln’s speech and the place this book serves in filling the gap in the historiography of Lincoln’s career. Then Holzer examines the tangled negotiations and political skullduggery that led a group of New York Republicans to invite mostly obscure western Republican stump speakers (including Lincoln) to give a series of political speeches to help draw votes away from Seward and for their favored candidate, Chase. After this Holzer examines the difficult historical labor that Lincoln spent in researching thoroughly the positions of the Founding Fathers (those 39 men who signed the US Constitution) in actual votes to allow or deny federal authority to regulate slavery in the territories, finding that 21 of the founders had explicitly voted in favor of such Congressional limitations either under the Articles of Confederation or Constitution, and that only 2 voted against such restrictions. Additionally, some of the other sixteen who had no official vote on record were known to be among the most noted antislavery men in the United States at the time of the Founding (Alexander Hamilton and Benjamin Franklin, for example).
At this point the book continues its very detailed and fact-based narrative and examines Lincoln’s trip to New York City (a harrowing one full of late-night transfers and dreadful conditions) as well as the ramshackle state of New York’s streets from primary source documentation. The book demonstrates Lincoln’s savvy about dealing with newspaper editors (in order to have his speeches published with the best formatting and to his advantage as a politician) as well as his desire to finally have a good campaign photo, which is provided in this case by the incomparable Matthew Brady. More than 100 pages of the book are complete by the time the book shows an awkward and rough looking Abraham Lincoln standing on the stage at Cooper Union on a chilly February evening beginning his speech and making a bad first impression (but a marvelous following one) on the sophisticated New York audience.
The longest chapter of the book, which is a close analysis of the Cooper Union speech and its fact-based approach, follows. Holzer demonstrates that Lincoln’s rhetoric, while not using triads (by the people, for the people, of the people) as he would so eloquently in later speeches, was itself a sophisticated example of parallelism that showed considerable elegance. Likewise, the Cooper Union was three speeches in one: the first, and longest, a masterpiece of political history, examining in detail the positions of the Founding Fathers on the issue of Congressional authority to regulate slavery in the territories in refutation of Stephen Douglas’ spurious Popular Sovereignty doctrine [2], the second a subtle attack on the South, and the third a stirring call to action for Republicans to remain true to their principles in the face of the pressure to compromise for the sake of a hollow peace.
After this most excellent summary of the speech itself (the entire speech is, including historical footnotes from a pamphlet whose publication was supervised by Lincoln, included in an Appendix which demonstrates Lincoln’s historical brilliance in vivid detail), Holzer focuses on the immensely positive impression Lincoln made on his audience. Additionally, Holzer examines in detail the often neglected follow-up speeches made in the Northeast (including one in Exeter, New Hampshire, where his eldest son Robert was attending a prep school to prepare for Harvard) that showed Lincoln’s rising position as a hopeful for the presidency as a direct result of the Cooper Union speech. The book closes with an examination of Lincoln’s subdued behavior through the rest of the 1860 campaign, which was according to the Victorian customs of reserve and silence, and an Epilogue which shows some of the later fate of the principals of the speech (showing that Lincoln rewarded most of the men who invited him to speak in New York, and demonstrating his recognition of the importance of the speech in winning him the Republican nomination).
The book as a whole is a gripping historical narrative, full of intriguing footnotes and showing the care and diligent historical research of a master historian. Anyone who wishes to see Lincoln’s savvy dealings with the press and his own careful attention to historical work and speech preparation ought to read this rewarding book. The fact that the book includes a great many quotations from Lincoln’s letters and those other letters and statements about him from his contemporaries makes the book a treasure trove of useful quotations and useful sources for the Lincoln scholar. I highly recommend this book, which is a definitive work on the importance and rhetorical excellence of Abraham Lincoln’s Cooper Union Address, fully meeting the ambitious goals set out by its able author to provide new and useful research about Abraham Lincoln and the pivotal importance of his most significant pre-presidential speech.
[1] https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress...
[2] https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress...
August 10, 2013
An awesome book that I've now read twice: once a few years ago and now a second time after borrowing it from my son (conveniently I gave it to him ). It is not simply a discussion of the speech at New York's Cooper Union that helped Lincoln become nominated and elected, but almost a biography of Lincoln covering the time period from October 1859 until his election in November 1860. Besides including the entire speech in an appendix and using a chapter to discuss and analyze the speech, there are chapters on Lincoln's activities leading up to the speech, his two weeks traveling through New England after Cooper Union (giving more speeches), the reprinting and repackaging of the speech by newspapers and the Republicans, and his nomination and election.
A few of the vast differences between 1860 and our time highlighted in this book:
1. While Abe could travel to and from NYC from Illinois by train, it was time-consuming and not that comfortable.
2. Listening to long sermons and speeches was a form of entertainment and education to people of the day. The Cooper Union speech lasted an hour and a half and Edward Everett's Gettysburg "Oration" (which was supposed to be the main event of the day) was two hours long.
3. Political events were closely followed in this time period. Three elections from 1840 - 1876 had a voter turnout of more than 80%, including in 1860. In the last 100 years, we've only gone over 62% once.
A few of the vast differences between 1860 and our time highlighted in this book:
1. While Abe could travel to and from NYC from Illinois by train, it was time-consuming and not that comfortable.
2. Listening to long sermons and speeches was a form of entertainment and education to people of the day. The Cooper Union speech lasted an hour and a half and Edward Everett's Gettysburg "Oration" (which was supposed to be the main event of the day) was two hours long.
3. Political events were closely followed in this time period. Three elections from 1840 - 1876 had a voter turnout of more than 80%, including in 1860. In the last 100 years, we've only gone over 62% once.
February 3, 2009
Lincoln's speech at Cooper Union was the event which secured him the Republican nomination in 1860. This speech was unlike many of his prior ones in that he did much more research and used a lot of statistics to prove his his point that the founders intended slavery to be "in the course of ultimate extinction." It was an overwhelming success in front of a sophisticated New York City audience. The other important event of this trip was a Matthew Brady portrait which became the iconic image for the campaign.
The book clarified much of the surrounding myths of the speech and the following speaking tour in New England. Well written.
The book clarified much of the surrounding myths of the speech and the following speaking tour in New England. Well written.
August 20, 2009
This is a clssic for anyone who wants to have more than a beginners knowledge of American History. The book is well written by an eminent Lincoln scholar who is not an academic--sometimes the best combination.
June 20, 2023
An admitted life long student of Abraham Lincoln I found this historical book thoroughly enjoyable to read.
Mr. Holzer argues that it was Lincoln's Cooper Union Speech that propelled Lincoln into The White House. I tend to agree with Mr. Holzer. I was quite familiar with said speech, but it has been many years since I've read it. In the author's book, Mr. Holzer renders a historical and well documented account how the speech was written and how those men were responsible for Lincoln's invitation to New York. Lincoln had never visited New York prior to his Cooper Union Speech.
Some historical background on Cooper Union. It was established, free tuition, in 1859 for gifted young boys and men who were interested in pursing studies in engineering, architecture and design.
When Lincoln became president the student body invited him back to speak; unfortunately, with the Civil War raging on, Lincoln, instead wrote and forwarded the following: "Honor to the Soldier, and Sailor everywhere, who bravely bears his country's cause. Honor also to the citizen who cares for his brother in the field, and serves, as best he can, the same cause-honor to him, only less than to him, who braves, for the common good, the storms of heaven and the storms of battle."
Mr. Holzer argues that it was Lincoln's Cooper Union Speech that propelled Lincoln into The White House. I tend to agree with Mr. Holzer. I was quite familiar with said speech, but it has been many years since I've read it. In the author's book, Mr. Holzer renders a historical and well documented account how the speech was written and how those men were responsible for Lincoln's invitation to New York. Lincoln had never visited New York prior to his Cooper Union Speech.
Some historical background on Cooper Union. It was established, free tuition, in 1859 for gifted young boys and men who were interested in pursing studies in engineering, architecture and design.
When Lincoln became president the student body invited him back to speak; unfortunately, with the Civil War raging on, Lincoln, instead wrote and forwarded the following: "Honor to the Soldier, and Sailor everywhere, who bravely bears his country's cause. Honor also to the citizen who cares for his brother in the field, and serves, as best he can, the same cause-honor to him, only less than to him, who braves, for the common good, the storms of heaven and the storms of battle."
December 9, 2022
Audible.com 11 hours 23 min. Narrated by Mark Bramhall (B)
For a brilliantly written and comprehensive review check out the one written by Sonny on Feb. 2, 2021!
For a brilliantly written and comprehensive review check out the one written by Sonny on Feb. 2, 2021!
July 3, 2011
In this book the author makes a convincing argument that this speech helped to make Lincoln president. More important he provides good evidence that without this speech and everything that grew out of it Lincoln would not even have been nominated.
The author makes good use of the different sources available in telling the story in chronological fashion. The use of letters, newspaper headlines and quoted dialog provide a variety that gives some pace to narrative history that some authors make dull. There are even photographs beginning with the the one taken by Matthew Brady the day of the speech. I enjoyed learning history by reading a small part of the biography of Abraham Lincoln. The more I learn about him the more I see him as a remarkable person. After the speech was given the sponsor group published a footnoted version of his speech. It took two people three weeks to thoroughly duplicate the research that Lincoln had put into his speech.
Reading the book I had the feeling that Lincoln was consciously running for President the whole time. He deliberately wrote a scholarly speech debunking his image as a western rube. Even though he began the speech by saying "Mr. Cheermen" in a high squeaky voice by the end he had connected with his audience and his voice was full and bold.
All of the audience, except the hardcore democrats, were amazed and moved by the speech. It was published in all of the newspapers and sold as a pamphlet for many years. Lincoln went on to speak twelve times in fourteen days throughout New England using the same speech and turned down many requests so that he could get back to Springfield. Lincoln definitely accomplished his goal of improving his political standing.
The author's portrayal of 19th century America included all of the aspects of daily life, riding for days on a train with no sleeping accommodations, getting covered with mud from the streets. I learned that Lincoln was a temperance man and 80% of the white males, the only voters, voted in the Presidential election of 1860.
I enjoyed the book and recommend it for anyone who has done some reading in this area. It was informative and entertaining. This is a well written account of a critical event in the election of 1860 and I would look for other books by this author.
The author makes good use of the different sources available in telling the story in chronological fashion. The use of letters, newspaper headlines and quoted dialog provide a variety that gives some pace to narrative history that some authors make dull. There are even photographs beginning with the the one taken by Matthew Brady the day of the speech. I enjoyed learning history by reading a small part of the biography of Abraham Lincoln. The more I learn about him the more I see him as a remarkable person. After the speech was given the sponsor group published a footnoted version of his speech. It took two people three weeks to thoroughly duplicate the research that Lincoln had put into his speech.
Reading the book I had the feeling that Lincoln was consciously running for President the whole time. He deliberately wrote a scholarly speech debunking his image as a western rube. Even though he began the speech by saying "Mr. Cheermen" in a high squeaky voice by the end he had connected with his audience and his voice was full and bold.
All of the audience, except the hardcore democrats, were amazed and moved by the speech. It was published in all of the newspapers and sold as a pamphlet for many years. Lincoln went on to speak twelve times in fourteen days throughout New England using the same speech and turned down many requests so that he could get back to Springfield. Lincoln definitely accomplished his goal of improving his political standing.
The author's portrayal of 19th century America included all of the aspects of daily life, riding for days on a train with no sleeping accommodations, getting covered with mud from the streets. I learned that Lincoln was a temperance man and 80% of the white males, the only voters, voted in the Presidential election of 1860.
I enjoyed the book and recommend it for anyone who has done some reading in this area. It was informative and entertaining. This is a well written account of a critical event in the election of 1860 and I would look for other books by this author.
June 3, 2018
Lincoln was a Western politician with few if little notice in the East. As the country was moving towards the Election of 1860 Lincoln needed to become the alternative to Republican frontrunner William Steward. That opportunity came in the form of the Copper Union Speech. The speech was sponsored by a group of New York Republicans seeking an alternative to Steward.
Harold Holzers book is the history of this speech and explains its importance to getting Lincoln first the nomination and then the Presidency.
This book has been on my shelf awhile and I’m glad I finally got to it.
The speech itself will go on to become Lincoln’s platform for the campaign to follow. It would be the most important politically of his speeches but the one lasted quoted from. But it does establish his grounds on why expansion of slavery was against the Founders intent.
But beyond the speech Holzer goes on to explain how going to New York and getting the major papers to carry and cover the address will lead Lincoln from being the dark horse candidate to the acceptable second choice after Steward.
The book stays focused on the speech and it’s impacts and at 250 pages is a great chance to spend some time with Lincoln in a focused examination of how he stage managed his entrance to the Eastern states.
Harold Holzers book is the history of this speech and explains its importance to getting Lincoln first the nomination and then the Presidency.
This book has been on my shelf awhile and I’m glad I finally got to it.
The speech itself will go on to become Lincoln’s platform for the campaign to follow. It would be the most important politically of his speeches but the one lasted quoted from. But it does establish his grounds on why expansion of slavery was against the Founders intent.
But beyond the speech Holzer goes on to explain how going to New York and getting the major papers to carry and cover the address will lead Lincoln from being the dark horse candidate to the acceptable second choice after Steward.
The book stays focused on the speech and it’s impacts and at 250 pages is a great chance to spend some time with Lincoln in a focused examination of how he stage managed his entrance to the Eastern states.
September 17, 2022
An excellent unveiling and exposition of Lincoln's address in Manhattan that set his course as the future president. It is undoubtedly his finest speech, his Second Inaugural Speech and the Gettysburg Address included, although it is hard to put paper between the three. Gettysburg and the second inaugural were perfect for their moment, Cooper Union for its purpose, precision, and power.
Several themes run through the book, including Lincoln's preparation for the speech and the office it would lead to, his passion for truth and right, the contentious political times, and the humanity of the man.
Most impressive to me is the degree of diligence the great man applied to his preparation for this moment, one he knew would likely make or break his campaign even before he had one in anything more than self-belief. He did not shirk on this work, and it is this work that came through in exacting detail and force when he spoke, precisely because he knew that he knew that he knew - because he had done the work.
This book is well researched, written, and presented (Audible.com version). The Cooper Union speech is largely unknown outside academic circles and is deserving of wider attention. It is instructional to today in many ways, as is the book itself in its description of how seriously citizens took the national discourse in a troubled time.
Several themes run through the book, including Lincoln's preparation for the speech and the office it would lead to, his passion for truth and right, the contentious political times, and the humanity of the man.
Most impressive to me is the degree of diligence the great man applied to his preparation for this moment, one he knew would likely make or break his campaign even before he had one in anything more than self-belief. He did not shirk on this work, and it is this work that came through in exacting detail and force when he spoke, precisely because he knew that he knew that he knew - because he had done the work.
This book is well researched, written, and presented (Audible.com version). The Cooper Union speech is largely unknown outside academic circles and is deserving of wider attention. It is instructional to today in many ways, as is the book itself in its description of how seriously citizens took the national discourse in a troubled time.
October 18, 2018
I've been doing a lot of Lincoln reading the last several months in preparation for a panel I'm going to be on. Lincoln at Cooper Union was one of the best. The author, Harold Holzer, provides a well-documented lead-up to the actual speech in New York City, including Lincoln's decision to accept the invitation, his extensive preparation for the speech, and his budding awareness of his appearance as a midwesterner in New York City. Since reading it, I have an even greater appreciation for his extensive and careful and scholarly presentation of his speeches. The book also provides rich descriptions of his appearance and the ways it was dramatically different -- and surprising -- to the New York audience. The speech itself is profound and appears in the book itself. Integrity. Good logic. Good arguments. It is a book to read in 30 minute segments because it is laden with footnotes and documentation. It provides a great window into the thinking of Lincoln. On my list of books I've read are others about Lincoln. I'm glad I read each one of them!!
August 22, 2015
Lincoln's Cooper Union Speech is arguably his most famous speech that most of us know nothing about. His speech at Coopers Union elucidated his overall positions on the most important issue of the time. In a time when news traveled in days or weeks Lincoln's speech traveled by newspaper and a (bestselling) pamphlet. His major stances were laid out and informed the voting public ( white men)of Republican positions. This famous address was to a large extent responsible for Lincoln's election to the presidency. We all know what happened next.....
September 3, 2013
Fascinating minute-by-minute account of Lincoln's travel to NYC for his "Cooper Union" speech, a final rebuttal to the Lincoln-Douglas debates, and the response that essentially won him the Presidency. Detailed and engrossing.
June 11, 2017
A wonderful book that tells the story of one of Lincoln's most successful (but as Holzer notes, least quoted) speeches. At this point in his political career, Lincoln was something of an also-ran when people talked about who the nominee would be for the Republicans in the upcoming 1860 election. The frontrunner was New York's own William Seward. This was Lincoln's first chance to speak to an eastern audience.
Fun facts about like that Lincoln's original invitation was to give his speech in Brooklyn at an abolitionist church but it was rescheduled at the last moment to Cooper Institute in Manhattan. Also amusing are all the various "myths" that have popped up over the years surrounding the speech (people taking various little bits of credit for it, seeing early drafts and making suggested changes, etc).
Most noteworthy is that this was NOT a stemwinder speech. At nearly 8000 words, Lincoln's speech was closer to a legal brief than a stump speech. The general topic being the federal government's ability to regulate slavery. Some called it the "final Lincoln/Douglas debate" and that's certainly true as Lincoln starts out immediately calling out Douglas and chastising him (gently) for the position that the signatories to the Constitution tried to EXCLUDE slavery from the federal government's purview.
Lincoln goes through the state delegations by name to show how they each and all expected and understood the slavery question to be entirely within the newly formed federal government's ability to regulate.
Also interesting is the details about HOW Lincoln gave his speech, Holzer quotes witnesses who described him as standing with his feet planted firmly on the floor, nearly no hand gestures, but relying on his facial expressions almost exclusively to engage his audience. It's an odd thing to imagine, but captivating at the same time.
While the speech is heralded as that which launched his presidential career, what's more amusing is that Lincoln still got trounced in New York City in the general election. Can't please everybody.
Fun facts about like that Lincoln's original invitation was to give his speech in Brooklyn at an abolitionist church but it was rescheduled at the last moment to Cooper Institute in Manhattan. Also amusing are all the various "myths" that have popped up over the years surrounding the speech (people taking various little bits of credit for it, seeing early drafts and making suggested changes, etc).
Most noteworthy is that this was NOT a stemwinder speech. At nearly 8000 words, Lincoln's speech was closer to a legal brief than a stump speech. The general topic being the federal government's ability to regulate slavery. Some called it the "final Lincoln/Douglas debate" and that's certainly true as Lincoln starts out immediately calling out Douglas and chastising him (gently) for the position that the signatories to the Constitution tried to EXCLUDE slavery from the federal government's purview.
Lincoln goes through the state delegations by name to show how they each and all expected and understood the slavery question to be entirely within the newly formed federal government's ability to regulate.
Also interesting is the details about HOW Lincoln gave his speech, Holzer quotes witnesses who described him as standing with his feet planted firmly on the floor, nearly no hand gestures, but relying on his facial expressions almost exclusively to engage his audience. It's an odd thing to imagine, but captivating at the same time.
While the speech is heralded as that which launched his presidential career, what's more amusing is that Lincoln still got trounced in New York City in the general election. Can't please everybody.
June 23, 2019
5 stars as a Lincoln buff. Between 4-5 stars if you are not. A learned a lot about the 1860 election I did not know and this book very effectively elucidates Lincoln's abilities as a writer and communicator.
February 11, 2024
One would think the book’s subtitle “The speech that made Abraham Lincoln President,” would set up an unattainable expectation of greatness. After all, how could a book hold a candle to a great speech? Or perhaps the speech was not so great after all and the author merely wanted to sell more books. And yet, I was wonderfully surprised to see that this really was an exceptional book about an exceptional speech.
Harold Holzer is a world-renowned expert on Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War. He has won several awards for the numerous books he has authored, co-authored, edited, or co-edited on this the most widely studied President in our history. Holzer takes us back to February 1860, a few months before the convention that would nominate Abraham Lincoln on the Republican ticket for President. He examines the opportunity given to Lincoln to speak in New York City, where powerful men like Horace Greeley are looking to put forth an alternative to New York’s favorite son, William Seward. Through the negotiations of when and where – and the ultimate surprise upon arrival to find the location had been moved from Brooklyn to Manhattan – Holzer shows a remarkable ability to build tension and anticipation leading to the actual speech itself. He gives us a taste of a time, that in the days before movies and television and 24-hour internet, men were drawn to great speakers, especially of the political variety.
And a great speech it was. With several chapters leading up to the speech, Holzer helps us see the intricate research and effort Lincoln exerted over several months to preparing what he felt, presciently so, was to be the most important speech in his life. One chapter is assigned the duty of parsing the intricate language of this 90-minute magnum opus. As Holzer so captivatingly relates, the speech consists of three main sections: the first a historical accounting of the founder’s beliefs regarding slavery. Lincoln takes a line from a speech given by his long-time rival from Illinois, Senator Stephen Douglas, in which he says “Our fathers, when they framed the Government under which we live, understood this question just as well, and even better, than we do now.” With these words repeated over and over in his speech at Cooper Union, Lincoln cleverly recounts the votes that in toto demonstrate convincingly that the founders of our country believed that the federal government did, in fact, have the right and the obligation to restrict the spread of slavery into the new territories. In the second section, Lincoln addresses himself directly to “the Southern people,” whom he knows will not hear his speech, all while cleverly speaking to northern Republicans whose support he needs. The third, and shortest section, asserts that Republicans cannot relinquish their principle that slavery is wrong just to placate the South, and ends with his now famous line: “Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.”
I read the full speech in the appendix before reading the rest of the book, then again – this time out loud, as if giving it myself – after finishing the chapter explaining its significance. While the speech as read is superb, it is when spoken out loud as an oration that it gains its ultimate power. Holzer has captured this masterpiece with his own masterpiece. This book is a must read for anyone interested in Abraham Lincoln, history, or simply the power of a well-prepared speech.
David J. Kent
Author, Lincoln: The Fire of Genius
President, Lincoln Group of DC
Harold Holzer is a world-renowned expert on Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War. He has won several awards for the numerous books he has authored, co-authored, edited, or co-edited on this the most widely studied President in our history. Holzer takes us back to February 1860, a few months before the convention that would nominate Abraham Lincoln on the Republican ticket for President. He examines the opportunity given to Lincoln to speak in New York City, where powerful men like Horace Greeley are looking to put forth an alternative to New York’s favorite son, William Seward. Through the negotiations of when and where – and the ultimate surprise upon arrival to find the location had been moved from Brooklyn to Manhattan – Holzer shows a remarkable ability to build tension and anticipation leading to the actual speech itself. He gives us a taste of a time, that in the days before movies and television and 24-hour internet, men were drawn to great speakers, especially of the political variety.
And a great speech it was. With several chapters leading up to the speech, Holzer helps us see the intricate research and effort Lincoln exerted over several months to preparing what he felt, presciently so, was to be the most important speech in his life. One chapter is assigned the duty of parsing the intricate language of this 90-minute magnum opus. As Holzer so captivatingly relates, the speech consists of three main sections: the first a historical accounting of the founder’s beliefs regarding slavery. Lincoln takes a line from a speech given by his long-time rival from Illinois, Senator Stephen Douglas, in which he says “Our fathers, when they framed the Government under which we live, understood this question just as well, and even better, than we do now.” With these words repeated over and over in his speech at Cooper Union, Lincoln cleverly recounts the votes that in toto demonstrate convincingly that the founders of our country believed that the federal government did, in fact, have the right and the obligation to restrict the spread of slavery into the new territories. In the second section, Lincoln addresses himself directly to “the Southern people,” whom he knows will not hear his speech, all while cleverly speaking to northern Republicans whose support he needs. The third, and shortest section, asserts that Republicans cannot relinquish their principle that slavery is wrong just to placate the South, and ends with his now famous line: “Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.”
I read the full speech in the appendix before reading the rest of the book, then again – this time out loud, as if giving it myself – after finishing the chapter explaining its significance. While the speech as read is superb, it is when spoken out loud as an oration that it gains its ultimate power. Holzer has captured this masterpiece with his own masterpiece. This book is a must read for anyone interested in Abraham Lincoln, history, or simply the power of a well-prepared speech.
David J. Kent
Author, Lincoln: The Fire of Genius
President, Lincoln Group of DC
August 8, 2017
David Herbert Donald's life work on Lincoln left us with a definitive and dispassionate biography that refused to glorify or demonize a president that society views emotionally, rather than objectively. Donald's greatest literary and historical accomplishment was rewriting Lincoln's two century old history as history. Donald's understudy, Harold Holzer, who worked closely with him until his death, is now the most important Lincoln historian alive today.
Holzer doesn't write over the ground that Donald already covered. Instead, Holzer takes the dispassionate base that Donald created, and carefully documents the more controversial or unknown aspects of Lincoln's career.
Holzer writes with a dismissiveness of much written about Lincoln in the past century. He is so confidant in his original research and historical judgement, he even seems dismissive of writers who followed him. While most of the modern generation will read Doris Kerns Goodwin or Joshua Sheik for popular retellings of Lincoln's life, character, and career, Holzer presents a more historically grounded view.
In this book, largely concerned with Cooper Union and Lincoln's surrogate Cooper speeches, Holzer makes the clear argument that Lincoln understood the intellectual side of his legal restructuring of the American government, even before he took office. His speech at Cooper Union is Lincoln's last address that clearly articulated a direct intellectual justification and defense. Lincoln felt that his Cooper address was his final intellectual thesis, preparing the country for his virtual rewriting of the Constitution, and justifying his actions for future generations.
(Lincoln's first and and second inaugural addresses, as well as his Gettysburg speech, were reactionary in nature, and were closer to poetic/artistic in statement. Lincoln, who read and wrote poetry for most of his life, seems to have believed that Cooper Union was his final purely intellectual argument, and used the presidential platform for the remainder of his life to deal with the reality of death and war through art. With the exception of his addresses to Congress, his presidential "speeches" can all be most clearly described as poetry.)
Holzer doesn't write over the ground that Donald already covered. Instead, Holzer takes the dispassionate base that Donald created, and carefully documents the more controversial or unknown aspects of Lincoln's career.
Holzer writes with a dismissiveness of much written about Lincoln in the past century. He is so confidant in his original research and historical judgement, he even seems dismissive of writers who followed him. While most of the modern generation will read Doris Kerns Goodwin or Joshua Sheik for popular retellings of Lincoln's life, character, and career, Holzer presents a more historically grounded view.
In this book, largely concerned with Cooper Union and Lincoln's surrogate Cooper speeches, Holzer makes the clear argument that Lincoln understood the intellectual side of his legal restructuring of the American government, even before he took office. His speech at Cooper Union is Lincoln's last address that clearly articulated a direct intellectual justification and defense. Lincoln felt that his Cooper address was his final intellectual thesis, preparing the country for his virtual rewriting of the Constitution, and justifying his actions for future generations.
(Lincoln's first and and second inaugural addresses, as well as his Gettysburg speech, were reactionary in nature, and were closer to poetic/artistic in statement. Lincoln, who read and wrote poetry for most of his life, seems to have believed that Cooper Union was his final purely intellectual argument, and used the presidential platform for the remainder of his life to deal with the reality of death and war through art. With the exception of his addresses to Congress, his presidential "speeches" can all be most clearly described as poetry.)
July 16, 2017
a look inside an extremely brief week in Lincoln's New York visit that left him exhausted without sleep. first the invitation to speak at a church turned out to be not an assembly of church goers in pews, but rather twisted in a turn-about, a large assembly auditorium filled with the intellectual elite of the city. the contrast of a hick persona amidst the polished educated thinkers and leaders of the day faded quickly to the credit of the audience as Lincoln's straight forward speech revealed his depth of legal issues and conviction regarding the issue of slavery in the expanding nation. Lincoln's reasoning and passion for the nation rallied these intellectuals around him in the push toward his nomination. Lincoln cared so much how the press reprinted his speech that he very early in the morning went to the newspaper and sat with the copy editor to proof the speech before it was printed. Attention to details such as this along with his thorough research planted his feet on firm ground while his humility and humor persuaded a second look at his potential. I especially appreciated reading the annotated copy of his Cooper Union speech.
March 7, 2015
I really enjoyed this examination of Lincoln work at Cooper Union. Holzer has placed the book within the historical context in which it was arranged, delivered, and later remembered. There are a ton of details, but none that I can think of that I deemed unnecessary. Each of them is woven into a tapestry of how this one speech, on one day, changed Lincoln, and subsequently America. Holzer makes a compelling case that Lincoln stepped out on the stage at Cooper Union like a unassuming batter stepping up to the plate in Game 1 of the World Series, who makes his presence known by hitting a long home run. That game, and the rest of the series, now depend on him, and he determines who wins. Cooper Union put Lincoln squarely on the national stage, and though he had his ups and downs, he never left it for the rest of his life. And now, would be considered an eternal part of everyone's conception of America. This book is a great read for anyone interested in how history can happen by just one small thing.
June 1, 2024
True to its title, the book tells the story of Lincoln’s early 1860 trip East to speak at Cooper Union in New York City. In doing so, it gives a vivid picture of Lincoln’s leap from being known mostly as a regional political figure from the uncouth “West” to a national Republican (the party of anti-slavery at that time) spokesperson and a plausible candidate for president of a deeply divided country. The key to this leap was Lincoln’s brilliant and remarkably constructed speech on February 27. Holzer makes clear that while the speech itself didn’t clinch the Republican nomination for him—Seward, right up to the Republican convention, was still the front runner—it firmly established Lincoln as a formidable contender. Lincoln himself, smart politician that he was, made good use of this new standing on the national stage.
November 14, 2020
The Cooper Union speech is widely regarded as the speech that gave Abraham Lincoln the 1860 Republican nomination and, by extension, the presidency. The book covers the reasons for Lincoln’s invitation to speak, his meticulous research of the Founding Fathers’ positions on Federal control of slavery in the territories, the speech itself, and its aftermath. The book also contains the entire text of the speech in an appendix.
I found a great parallel between the political arguments made on many issues of our time and the arguments made in the speech.
For somebody with a casual interest in Lincoln or the causes of the Civil War, this book is probably overkill. But for a Civil War/Lincoln devotee, this book fits the bill.
I found a great parallel between the political arguments made on many issues of our time and the arguments made in the speech.
For somebody with a casual interest in Lincoln or the causes of the Civil War, this book is probably overkill. But for a Civil War/Lincoln devotee, this book fits the bill.
April 18, 2015
Abraham Lincoln’s speech at the Cooper Union in 1860 turned him into a serious presidential candidate. This book is a marvelous look at the speech’s content, context, and effect. It starts with the invitation to speak and follows Lincoln as he prepares the speech, travels to New York, and gives the speech. As it does, Holzer explains the issues of the day – the problems, the proposed solutions, and the differences between parties and leaders within parties. Then he offers a detailed description and analysis of the speech itself. Lincoln was one of our greats, and his greatest tool was words. This book does a great job of explaining the words that helped make him president.
August 22, 2013
I loved this. Harold Holzer, another brilliant Lincoln historian (if you need proof, he was one of the on-call references for the recent Lincoln movie by Spielberg), narrates the events surrounding Lincoln's masterful Cooper Union speech. This is one of Lincoln's most famous speeches, because it propelled him into the limelight of politics and essentially secured his place on the Republican ballot in 1860, which then led to his election. If you're interested in history, especially the history and politics around Lincoln's time, this is a must-read.
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